I'm basing this on three things -- all of which are pretty sketchy for various reasons:
1) My own experience with the matrix. Admittedly a cheaper car than the Saabs I was more familiar with. The clutch gave out really early (~30k km) and Toyota refused to consider it under warranty --clutches are normally not covered by warranties, but seriously, 30k km driven by a mother familiar with manual transmissions? Also, the plastic front skirt clips all broke and paint chipped like crazy. The disc brakes have inadequate ventilation and rusted earlier than they ought to have -- I'm told VW disc brakes have the same problem.
2) I read something somewhere about Toyota build quality going down. When I read it I said "aha, so it wasn't just this car" but didn't save a reference to it.
Note that Toyota is still in the top 10 but compare it to Honda and Mazda with half the warranty claims. It's still better than the likes of Chrysler and Alfa though with double again the claims of Toyota. let alone Jeep, Porsche, and Landrover with more than 3 times the claims (Though this takes into account the dollar amounts which is why they fare so poorly).
That said, their US numbers look better. They have slightly lower rates of failures than Honda. These stats don't take into account repair costs. So either their US plants are doing better than their European plants or their repairs aren't especially common, just more expensive.
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1) My own experience with the matrix. Admittedly a cheaper car than the Saabs I was more familiar with. The clutch gave out really early (~30k km) and Toyota refused to consider it under warranty --clutches are normally not covered by warranties, but seriously, 30k km driven by a mother familiar with manual transmissions? Also, the plastic front skirt clips all broke and paint chipped like crazy. The disc brakes have inadequate ventilation and rusted earlier than they ought to have -- I'm told VW disc brakes have the same problem.
2) I read something somewhere about Toyota build quality going down. When I read it I said "aha, so it wasn't just this car" but didn't save a reference to it.
3) A company which sells used car warranties publishes their stats based on their actual warranty claims at:
http://www.reliabilityindex.co.uk/top10.html?apc=3128339010848601
Note that Toyota is still in the top 10 but compare it to Honda and Mazda with half the warranty claims. It's still better than the likes of Chrysler and Alfa though with double again the claims of Toyota. let alone Jeep, Porsche, and Landrover with more than 3 times the claims (Though this takes into account the dollar amounts which is why they fare so poorly).
That said, their US numbers look better. They have slightly lower rates of failures than Honda. These stats don't take into account repair costs. So either their US plants are doing better than their European plants or their repairs aren't especially common, just more expensive.